Watered down planning bill should be scrapped

28 November 2013

 

Now that the planning reforms of the Government’s White Paper have been watered down and amended by opposition parties they should be scrapped, says the Urban Taskforce.
“The final form of the Planning Bill bears little relation to the well thought out White Paper that the Government proposed only 6 months ago,” says Urban Taskforce CEO, Chris Johnson. “We now have a document authored by many hands but not owned by any one of them.”
“Code Assessable development has been removed but the greater involvement of communities in setting the rules remains. An extra levy on development to fund affordable housing will only increase the cost of all housing.”
“If NSW wants to build houses at the numbers that are needed it will be better to keep the existing planning system that everyone understands rather than go through years of transitional pain to implement the watered down reforms that will slow down planning approvals.”
“It is most unfortunate that the Upper House has become a feeding frenzy of individuals each wanting to vandalize the Governments bill. If implemented the people of NSW would have the most confusing planning system in the country and this will drive investors away.”
“Community Action Groups that lobbied individual members of parliament have put the state back many years by taking a NIMBY attitude that stops change. Sydney needs over 32,000 new homes every year and we are only producing 21,000 now. The Planning Act needs to encourage more housing but groups like the Greens call this being “pro-developer” and imply this is bad. Planning is about the future and this needs real leadership rather than endless participatory processes in a context where development is seen as being destructive”
“There are many opportunities to implement some of the proposed reforms through the existing legislation and the Urban Taskforce believes this is where planning reforms should now be focused.”

Now that the planning reforms of the Government’s White Paper have been watered down and amended by opposition parties they should be scrapped, says the Urban Taskforce.

“The final form of the Planning Bill bears little relation to the well thought out White Paper that the Government proposed only 6 months ago,” says Urban Taskforce CEO, Chris Johnson. “We now have a document authored by many hands but not owned by any one of them.”

 

“Code Assessable development has been removed but the greater involvement of communities in setting the rules remains. An extra levy on development to fund affordable housing will only increase the cost of all housing.”

 

“If NSW wants to build houses at the numbers that are needed it will be better to keep the existing planning system that everyone understands rather than go through years of transitional pain to implement the watered down reforms that will slow down planning approvals.”

 

“It is most unfortunate that the Upper House has become a feeding frenzy of individuals each wanting to vandalize the Governments bill. If implemented the people of NSW would have the most confusing planning system in the country and this will drive investors away.”

 

“Community Action Groups that lobbied individual members of parliament have put the state back many years by taking a NIMBY attitude that stops change. Sydney needs over 32,000 new homes every year and we are only producing 21,000 now. The Planning Act needs to encourage more housing but groups like the Greens call this being “pro-developer” and imply this is bad. Planning is about the future and this needs real leadership rather than endless participatory processes in a context where development is seen as being destructive” 

 

“There are many opportunities to implement some of the proposed reforms through the existing legislation and the Urban Taskforce believes this is where planning reforms should now be focused.”

 

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